1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a system for managing the property of research and development in which experiment notebooks, property relating to research and development for various products, are computerized, and experiment data and ideas relating to items described in experiment notebooks are efficiently used and managed.
2. Background Art
Regarding the experiment apparatus used for research and development for various products, those capable of obtaining measurement or imaging results in the form of electronic data account for the greatest percentage, and such data is electronically stored in personal computers or the like separately. However, experiment notebooks, or experiment records are still written by hand, and the computerization thereof has not made much progress in the present circumstances. Namely, a troublesome, old-style way requiring, for example, a task of pasting hardcopies of experiment data in experiment notebooks is still mainly used, and therefore, it cannot be said that the merit of the computerization of data is sufficiently enjoyed under the present circumstances where report writing, research-paper writing, or patent-application filing is done with electronic data.
Generally, the experiment notebooks, or experiment records need to be created so that the following requirements are satisfied:
Note that, for convenience sake, the requirements are classified roughly into two, description requirements and operation requirements.
(a) Description Requirements:    a1. Such information as comprehensible to a third person must be sufficiently described;    a2. All that is necessary for experiments must be specified (primary data is the most important);
The primary data refers to raw data obtained by measurement apparatus.    a3. All processes after secondary data must be entered;
The secondary data refers to data that is obtained by adding some process to the primary data.    a4. Upon completion of experiment, conclusions for the results of the experiment must be presented and an evaluation of the conclusions must be made;    a5. A title and a motive/objective comprehensible to anybody must be entered;    a6. The normal names of abbreviations/brevity codes must be described in advance in context, so that they are comprehensible;    a7. References must be entered; and    a8. Description must be made so that the scope of an experiment is clearly specified.(b) Operation Requirements:    b1. The back of each of the notebooks to be used must be sewed, and the notebooks must be numbered according to date, with earliest dates first;    b2. Pens using indelible ink, such as ballpoint pens, must be used;In cases in which any content of the notebooks need to be corrected or anything needs to be added thereto, the date and the name of the person who has made the correction or addition must be entered.    b3. The fact that the notebooks cannot be falsified or has not been falsified must be verified;    b4. The notebooks must be strictly managed as quasi-official documents;    b5. Ideas, anything that comes to the attention, or the like also need to be entered as clearly as possible, along with the dates of the process of conception, implementation, completion, or the like; and    b6. One's own signature and that of a third person are required for confirmation.
These requirements need to be satisfied for computerization, resulting in a cause for preventing the computerization of experiment notebooks.
In the United States, as a regulation relating to electronic records and electronic signatures, there is Part 11 of Title 21 of the Code of Federal Regulations. This was established as a regulation for assuring that electronic records and electronic signatures are legally equally reliable as a substitute for paper records and conventional handwritten signatures and are thus equivalent thereto. Regarding the electronic records or electronic signature systems in conformity with the above Part 11, various products have been developed by various companies. However, no products are found relating to systems in which the experiment notebooks satisfying the above description requirements and operation requirements are computerized.
Conventionally, there are Patent Documents 1 and 2 below as conventional techniques directed to experiment data:
Patent Document 1: JP Patent Publication (Kohyo) No. 2003-517229 A
Patent Document 2: JP Patent Publication (Kohyo) No. 2005-520225 A
The invention disclosed in Patent Document 1 relates to a method and system for enabling multiple users from physically-different locations to access, observe, control, and manipulate physical processes and devices via a network.
The invention disclosed in Patent Document 2 relates to an experiment management system and method for automating experiments within an automated environment without the need to isolate the test subject from that environment.